Level Two
by NovaStars42
Summary: Where do the Akatsuki go when they die?


Level two

Back before I joined the Akatsuki, I lived with my family in a secluded farming village,where nearly everyone was a subsistence farmer. My grandparents lived with us, and I remember just before my grandfather passed, the blacksmith had been musing about afterlife. My family was sort of a mix of buddhist and Shinto, but I myself was not religious, so I listened, hoping to find my own way to god though words.

"What if this isn't the end?" He croaked, " what if, when you go there is more? Maybe this is just level one, and after death there's more?"

I smilies at my ailing grandfather, "I'm not sure," and put water to his lips. He passed a few days later. I was prepared, not to say I wasn't sad. I joined the Akatsuki a few years later, and now you might ask, what would they need with a farmer? Though I couldn't use it, because I knew no jutsu, there had been no ninja in my family for years, my keki genki was an enhanced forum of chakra control, and I was able to give my chakra to others, boosting their power. Not to mention some dujitsu and smithing skills for weapons I picked up on the way.

It was the end now, the last great shinobi war was over, and I was dead, dieing actually. There was a pike shoved through my chest, and I was slowly bleeding out. I wasn't afraid, I waited, and waited. It was not painful, I was mostly numb. You would imagine when you died, it all went black and either nothing, or you went to your self, or predetermined place, depending on how you worshiped, but, I didn't feel anything, no flames of hell, no sky's of heaven, not that I thought I was actually going there after killing so many. I didn't see anything, and it took me a minute before I realized I could move. There was no pike sticking out of me, and as I looked down, no blood either. My surroundings were white, no clear definition of floor and wall.

"They got you to hmm?" I knew that voice,

"Deidara?" I asked as I spun around. There he was, the bomber in all his glory, blonde hair still in his face and clean. Clearly not blown to unrecognizable bits. You would never guess who else was there I bet, the rest of the Akatsuki, minus the leader, Konan, that Tobi fellow and Hidan. They sat, each one of them, some cross legged, some sprawled, in a semi circle. What was this campfire story time?

"Before you even ask, we are in the middle,"

"The middle of what?"

"Purgatory," I watched the words come from his lips.

"Maybe we shouldn't call it that," Kisame remarked. The worried faced blonde artist just gave him a dirty look, "Look, all I'm saying is that I don't think I believe that,"

Deidara looked at him again like he was stupid. It occurred to me, that he was right. We are in purgatory, just as my friend had said. Or well, whatever you wanted to call it. Wasn't that a Christian word?

"Where are the others?" I ask sitting down next to Deidara.

"Tobi, uh, Madara, maybe? I don't know, they, they went that way," he motioned to somewhere off in the distance, but you couldn't really tell anything, just that general direction, "He was screaming about how this wasn't right, and he took the leader and Konan with him, they were all a mess un, a big screaming mess," and suddenly I could see the three, panicking, now faced with judgement. The others were quiet, I could see Kisame silently praying. No matter what happened, I knew we would meet God next. Whoever, whatever, whenever God was. I too became very scared.

"I don't suppose we could wait much longer," Kakazu said finally breaking the silence. He never believed in Hidan's god, I knew, he thought it was a load of bull and made his thoughts known to Hidan until both of their passing. Kakazu now I bet, wished he'd given a shit because Hidan wasn't here, and he was. I reasoned he was still in the hole Shikamaru Nara buried him in, or with his lord, I'm not sure which was better for him, judging by his rituals.

We all just sat then, waiting, and waiting, and I knew for Sasori, one of the first to die, it must have been a long time waiting.

"I'm going," Kisame stood and announced. We all stared at him, "I am ready," None of these men ever struck me as religious, but suddenly I knew it to be very important. "I have not reached enlightenment," he stated, as if hoping he was right, "I know Buddha will grand me reincarnation,"

We watched him go, and I knew the others were just as surprised as I to find that Kisame was a Buddhist. He disappeared after walking in the same direction Deidara said the others left to. We never saw him again. Weather he was actually reincarnated, we will never know, nor will he. Itachi was the next to stand, and we all knew he was damned after what he had done. Itachi believed as my family had growing up, sort of a Buddhist Shinto mix, I knew from speaking with him about this very subject, where you go when you die, unknown to either of us the foreshadowing of that event. Maybe, just maybe, he wouldn't be damned, if that was even how Shinto religion worked, I suddenly wished I'd payed more attention when I was a child to teachings. To late for that now. He too was gone, and now it was only the four of us.

"Forgive me Father for I have sinned," Deidara muttered, and I glanced his way as he began reciting what I came to know as Christianity's the Lord's Prayer.

"Your Christian?" I asked, pretty surprised. Christianity was very rare in Japan. Deidara nodded.

"Always have been un," he noted, and instantly I knew I would never see him again, if I ever saw anyone again. He was younger than I, though he had sinned plenty on his own before he was forced to join the Akatsuki, the organization might have been his damning, though I thought, was it really his fault then? If he had been forced were they really his sins? I didn't know, my knowledge of Christianity was limited.

Everything made sense in the calming white. These murderous criminals, homicidal maniacs, they had all held these worried, however hopeful looks on tired faces, as if now of all places to doubt what they believed. In this peace, just before they met whatever maker there was. I thought back to my grandfather, faced with death he had done the same. The mighty Akatsuki was afraid. With three of our group already crossed, to where I didn't know. So much unknown, were they really gone or just on the other side of whatever that was? Was there one god or many? Who believed what was right? Would you be punished if you were wrong? These questions would never be answered. Where ever I went, I knew I would not see any of them.

Suddenly Deidara was sobbing, begging some unknown force for forgiveness. Kakazu was the next to rise, I had no idea what he believed, and it was too late to ask him. Perhaps after all of his thinking, he supposed he could join Hidan, or maybe he settled for whatever would come ahead of him. What if he was atheist? What then? I wrapped my arms around Deidara, attempting to comfort him though I was just as afraid.

"I'm going to hell!" He sobbed, he knew I, I knew it, and so did Sasori.

"I can't stay here forever, not with everyone leaving," he was younger than I was, and I pitied him like a child. There was only one way.

"Deidara," came the puppets soft voice. It occurred to me he was live now, not the same modified body, no, this was his human soul. The blonde 19 year old quieted, and we both turned our attention to Sasori.

"We'll go with you,"

And suddenly I was accompanying them to hellfire. Sasori, I came to know, abstained from religion and afterlife belief, though I wondered how you could not so much as think about it. Sasori stood, and I did too. It was time to cross it seemed. We pulled our train wreck of a friend from the floor, and with one of us on either side of him, we walked into the unknown. Were we actually going to hell? I can't say, I didn't believe as Deidara did, I didn't know what I believed, but you couldn't go somewhere you didn't believe in right? I couldn't help but think of myself as we crossed that imaginary line.

* * *

Authors note: I've been musing on religion and my own beliefs for quite a while now, probably since I was around 12 or 13, I maintained I was atheist, but now I'm not so sure. I'm 17 now and I have not yet found what I want to believe. I'm not sure if it all goes dark or actually go somewhere so I know a lot of people do believe you go. I learned so much about others and their religions and beliefs, and each of these people represented a forum of a different religion, Hidan being a minority in his own, the largely followed Asian religions, and I wanted to make Sasori Muslim, but I changed my mind instead making him abstain.  
we will never know if Kakazu was an atheist, there are other possibilities, Judaism, catholic, Muslim, as we will never know the thoughts and whereabouts of the others.

To me, the middle, I refuse to call it purgatory because that is not how I think myself to believe, is level two, if there are threes and fours somewhere, I guess I'll have to wait to find out. If you all liked this, I suppose I could continue on level three with Sasori and Deidara, though I'm not sure how I could do that seeing as I'm not sure where they went myself, but I could try to imagine.


End file.
